Friday, 10 October 2014

Light at The End of a Glasgow Day

His nostrils filled with the November smoke from a thousand chimneys as he turned down into Byres Road.

This
being the second Wednesday in the month meant it was his turn to open
up and get the heating on; it wasn’t too much to ask, but it still
annoyed him. Here he was, a student at the university, the first in the
family as far back as anyone could remember, but still he was expected
to muck in with the ‘business’ as his father called it, or a ‘run down
Glasgow cinema’ as Sandy described it to his fellow students.

The
building had started off as a glorified hut in the early 1900s holding
no more than about sixteen people, although Sandy’s grandfather tended
to squeeze in, with a shove, another ten on a Saturday night. At a
couple of pennies a head to show some old silent fare, it was a nice way
of making money. A very nice way as it turned out, and his grandfather
tried to find ways to make it even nicer.

When
he heard that Roy Rogers and Trigger were in town he marched down to
the Central Station with a bribe, if Roy and his horse would attend a
showing of their movie at his cinema then he’d feed then fish and chips
for a week. His grandfather pestered Roy’s people so much that they
threw him out of the railway station without Roy ever knowing of the
offer. The same thing happened with Laurel and Hardy and despite
everything, the cinema still made money; tons of it.

It
was because of the Majestic cinema – a cinema by the way which was
tidy, comfortable and well maintained, that the family had found the
money to allow Sandy to go to university to read English in the first
place. It had also bought the families plush villas in the west of the
city. So to call it ‘run down’ said more about Sandy than a plain truth
about the building.

Sandy
was twenty-three and a bit older than the rest of the student body in
the English department. The others tended to come from families of
bankers, shipbuilding and industry. Yet, despite this lucky start to
their lives, not one of them could hold a candle to Sandy’s genius; a
word he used as frequently as ‘run down’.

Sandy’s
hands were freezing as he struggled to find the keys in his long
overcoat. Once inside the cinema he was always hit in the face by the
redness of the paint. No matter how many second Wednesdays he opened
that door, the harshness of the decor always came as a surprise. As he
told his classmates that very morning, the whole building was like a
Turkish bordello and smelt worse. This had brought a pleasing chuckle
from his student friends.

Mary
was the Majestic’s ‘girl Friday’ and she loved the job. It involved
selling tickets, orange juice and tubs of ice cream in the foyer and the
ability to walk backwards down the aisles. The family was a pleasure to
work for and after all they paid her extremely well.

Three
things kept her there however, the first was that she really loved the
movies, so in between her duties she could slide into a seat and get
lost in the latest releases; American or British she didn’t care as long
as there was a chance to laugh and moment to shed a tear.

The
other two things were the twins, Sandy and Donald. She had been in
love with both of them for a very long time. Despite their similar looks
they were very different people except in one respect, they both
manipulated people to get what they wanted.

Sandy
was the clever one; the one that everyone knew was going to go places.
Donald was the physical son; the one who fought Sandy’s battles and
would walk a thousand miles to protect his brother. Some people feared
National Service but Donald graciously consumed everything the army
threw at him.

There
was a time when Mary couldn’t wait for the second Wednesday in the
month as it meant she and Sandy could be alone, but he had changed.
Ever since he had started at the university, he had become someone else.
He was still a kind person but now he liked to inform you of that fact.

Sandy’s
kindness grated with Mary, to be done a good deed by someone and then
to be told how kind it was - well, it somehow destroyed the act. People
who told you they were kindness itself were unaware that they were the
most selfish of individuals. If you didn’t accept their gifts, advice,
charity then you automatically caused them hurt – there was the
blackmail, there was the aggression, this was Sandy.

Donald,
on the other hand enjoyed life and living and although he was in the
army, he would still refer to himself as a loner but Mary considered
this just another way to manipulate people. Loners controlled situations
by not being there, by removing themselves from the activity - they
demanded to be noticed by their absence.

Yet,
despite everything, they were all the best of friends and she did enjoy
their company. Donald was on leave from Germany and was due to arrive
that evening.As she walked out from the cold night and through the doors
into the ticket booth, the place was beginning to warm up. It meant
Sandy was down in the cellar stacking coal for the boiler.

The
cinema was open six days a week and everyone rested on the Sabbath.
This was a day for a meal with Sandy and his family which Mary was
always invited to, as she no longer had anyone living.

Every
second Wednesday in the month, Nessie and Ian McLeod, the boys’ parents
would take the day off for a trip away. Sometimes it was Loch Lomond,
or Edinburgh for the shops, or sometimes they would just sit in the back
garden and read. Those were the days when Sandy and Mary ran the cinema
and as a Wednesday was half-price day for the pensioners, it tended to
be busy with those who just came in for some company or to keep out of
the cold.

Today
they were showing a couple of British gangster movies. Some of the
older ones loved them, especially the women pensioners who seemed to
like their baddies, really bad - even if it meant they had to hide
behind the popcorn from time to time. It was the coming attractions that
also excited Mary, and one of those that was arriving any day now was
Love Me Tender with Elvis Presley and Mary couldn’t wait.

She
could hear Sandy singing in the basement, in the last few months it was
always the same song, one she had bought him earlier in the year – ‘The
Ballad of Davy Crockett’. At least Ian, Sandy’s dad, allowed that one
to be played on the family gramophone, unlike ‘Rock Around the Clock’ by
Bill Haley.

“What a load of rubbish. Whatever next? Rock around the clock indeed.” was Mister McLeod’s take on it.

She
took two bottles of cola from the foyer fridge and went down to the
basement. There he was, the English student, shovelling coal into the
furnace and as she stood staring at him for a moment, he finished off
his song. It was at times like these she was sure it was Sandy she
loved.

Mary was just about to interrupt Sandy when there was a call from upstairs.

“Are you two down there?”

It was Donald and he was early. With his usual enthusiasm, he bounded down the stairs two at a time.

“What’s all this then, you two up to no good?”

Sandy dropped his shovel and embraced his brother who had spent three more minutes in the world than him.

"Let me give you a hand little brother, that way the three of us can get a drink sooner.”

The
final movie was ‘The Good Die Young’ with Laurence Harvey and then the
old and the wrinkled were ushered out quickly. There was a young couple
kissing in one of the corners but when they looked up and saw Mary,
Sandy and Donald all staring back at them, it killed off their ardour
and they exited into the cold night with their lips still stuck
together.

Once
the theatre was checked for stragglers - as there had been folks locked
in over night before - Sandy switched off the heating and shut the
door.

“Where to, guys and lassie?” asked the ever energetic Donald.

Sandy
wasn’t happy, “I’ll see you at the weekend brother and anyway I’ve got
studies. I was going to walk Mary home, you see I’m kind that way”

“I’m only here for the night, I’m going on to a pal's wedding in the morning” said a disappointed Donald.

"What about a quick drink at the Locarno?” asked Mary.

“Great idea” said Donald, “come on brother, what is it Granddad calls the movies?”

“Light at the end of the day” answered Sandy. Mary liked that expression.

“And that’s what we need now. Some light. One swift one in the Locarno then you can get back to your nonsense.”

The
brothers didn’t say much as they sauntered up towards Charing Cross.
The doorman at the Locarno wasn’t really up for letting them in until he
spotted Donald and then the three of them were waved on.

The
Locarno was half empty, or half full depending on your idea of a
Wednesday night out. It was mainly full of Italians who had closed
their businesses for a half day, meaning they could stay open all day
Saturday.

The Joe Loss Orchestra was the band for the evening but was clearly failing to excite the rich merchants of Glasgow.

Over
in one corner sat a small man with greasy black hair. When anyone
passed his table, there were calls of ‘Good evening Giuseppe’, ‘How are
you Giuseppe’ or something in Italian that Donald didn’t understand but
it annoyed him anyway. This Giuseppe character seemed to be staring at
Mary but she had failed to notice the man since she was so caught up in a
joke with Sandy.

It
didn’t seem to matter what Donald did, he felt that he was never good
enough for Mary. Oh he loved her alright, loved her big time, but he
just couldn’t get her to notice. Since he couldn’t compete with his
twin, he would take himself off somewhere alone, hoping that just once
Mary would follow but she never did. Maybe Mary thought he was trouble.

Giuseppe
was a short man, and with short men come big grievances. The little
Italian managed to bump his way all across the dance floor, and given
the sparseness of the crowd it was actually very good going. He bumped
into Donald which was one bump too many. It would be wonderful in this
life if we knew we were about to bump once too often, but that’s a
luxury we never receive.

All six feet of Donald followed the little man into the toilet.

“Why are you staring at my friend?” asked Donald.

“Who is your-a friend?”

“The good looking girl with my brother.”

“Then maybe it’s-a your-a brother you should be having this argument with.”

As
Donald pushed Giuseppe, he knew he was probably right in what he had
said but he kept pushing none the less. The little Italian backed away
until there was nowhere else to go.

“Look-a I don’t want-a trouble.” Said in a thick Glasgow-Italian accent.

“So you don’t want-a trouble?” mimicked Donald.

“Please, leave me alone-a. I begga you."

All
he meant to do was give him one more shove, but the floor beneath
Giuseppe was wet and the little man hit his head on the edge of the sink
on the way down.

Donald
felt like running but instead he stayed and told the police everything -
except that he let them think that Giuseppe Aldo had started the
argument. Giuseppe Aldo, husband and father to six daughters,died in
hospital three days later.

One
little push, that was all, one little push that changed everything.
This was 1955 and manslaughter was only admissible if it was in
self-defence. The judge felt that there was reasonable doubt with regard
to Donald’s story and the jury thought so too. As he had entered the
toilet several witnesses reported seeing Donald in an angry mood and
visibly drunk.

The Aldo mob cheered just as strongly as the McLeod clan wept when the death sentence was passed.

Donald was hanged on July 20th,
1955, exactly a week after Ruth Ellis, the last woman in Britain to be
hanged.The Majestic was sold off to some big time corporation and
Donald’s parents both died of reportedly broken hearts within a few
weeks of one another.

Mary was the last person to talk to Donald before he was hanged. It had been at his own request.

“Stop crying Mary, please.” Then he whispered something into her ear before kissing her goodbye.

That something is what went through her head as she stepped on to a train at Glasgow Central and left her city forever.

“There will be light at the end of the day my darling, there will be light at the end of the day."

About Me

I was born in the West Coast of Scotland - a beautiful part of the world. Grew up in Paris, France and Woodstock, New York. I studied writing at college and gained a Masters. I wrote a short film 'Stealing Moses' which was selected by the British Urban Film Festival, 2015 and was supported by Channel 4. I have been selected to pitch at BAFTA, twice. I trained through TAPS at Emmerdale and The Bill.